Jim Duncan Wargamer

Saturday, 11 April 2015

Winston Churchill Autobiography

Wednesday, 8 April 2015

Casualty Markers - Another Batch

A chum of mine liked my casualty markers so much that he bought them. Then he rummaged around in his own bits box and asked me to make some more.

Here they are, all based up and ready to paint.

There was a cannon which might have been a key ring at one time.

A French fusilier cut away from his base and dunked face down in the dirt.

An Officer received the same treatment.

There were some bits of plastic cannon.

A drummer sans drum.

Some proper casualties, Perry perhaps.

Some more plastic cannon, single trail this time.

A British ranker ...

And an Officer.

Some more Perry casualties, eyes right.

And some more, eyes left.

I black undercoated them all.

This painting style starts off with painting all the shadows first.

Including the shadows underneath the figure.

Then I heavily dry-brush them with white.

Done carefully this brings out a lot of the surface detail.

Note the contrast between the black and white areas.

Then it is a simple matter of adding colour to the white bits.

The bronze cannon barrel got a coat of dark brown, then mid-brown and finally some 'shiny' gold.

I carefully painted the white bits on the jacket with watered down blue paint. This allows any of the black areas to show through.

Similarly thinned red paint on the British jacket allows the shading to remain. The rest of the painting is obvious, keep the paint thin. Finish with a dark wash and a coat of matt varnish.

I had, of course, added some basing material, some gravel and some static grass at the appropriate points. Dice holders are from Minibits.

What do you think guys?

Monday, 23 March 2015

Big Day Over - Back to Wargaming

Here's me and my good lady at the weekend. Nope, it wasn't for the rugby.

My youngest daughter Susan was married at the weekend.

Here she is with her new husband Craig.

Some of the photographs were taken at South Queensferry.

Downstream is the famous Forth Bridge.

Upstream is the Forth Road Bridge with the pillars of the new Queensferry Crossing bridge in the background.

I am reliably informed that this is the only place in the world where there is an Nineteenth Century bridge, a Twentieth Century bridge and a Twentyfirst Century bridge crossing a major river at the same place.

How good is that!

Now back to wargaming and where did I leave my paintbrush.

Tuesday, 17 March 2015

Casualty Markers, from the Bits Box

I made some more casualty markers for a chum using some odd bits from the bits box.

The cannon balls are way over scale but do the job nicely. They are pellets from a kids toy gun glued into a pyramid. The bases are 30mm square.

The rest are spare torsos, spare arms and heads from the bits box. I had no legs for them so I cunningly modelled them in the shade of some shrubbery.

The bases are 30 x 50mm. The dice holders are from Minibits.

http://www.minibits.net/

I also finished off some 54mm WW2 British infantry figures that my recently deceased chum had started. I think they are made by Airfix.

I hope to make up a platoon or so of these and put them on sale at a show later in the year to raise funds for charity.

Monday, 9 March 2015

On your marks, get set, Charge

I bought a packet of acrylic charge markers at the weekend from Figures in Comfort.

http://www.figuresincomfort.net/

Nice, but a bit plain I thought.

I married it with a 30x30mm MDF base from Warbases.

http://war-bases.co.uk/

I applied some paint and some static grass and et voila.

Now, that is an enhanced enhancement.

Sunday, 1 March 2015

Baccus 6mm ACW - Army of the Potomac

I have just about finished the Union component of the Baccus 6mm ACW Boxed Set.

Not bad going for 4 weeks work including a good few distractions.

These will be my Army of the Potomac.

There are 10 artillery bases.

12 bases of infantry, two of them Zouaves.

2 cavalry bases with mounted, dismounted and empty horses.

6 command bases

All the bases are setup for Polemos, 60 x 30 for infantry and cavalry, 30 x 30 for artillery and commanders. I have left room for magnetic labels at the rear of the base.

Since I want to use these figures with other rulesets I have used 20 x 20 sub-bases which magnetically attach to the 60 x 30 base which is topped with steel paper. For example, Longstreet will need as many as ten 20 x 20 sub-bases for each Regiment and a starter Brigade will have three of them so I will need to get a few more infantry.

Attaching them is a doddle.

The painting of 6mm figures is not particularly demanding. I am a month away from being an old age pensioner and I coped with these OK. An 'impressionist' style is acceptable, certainly at tabletop level. I know that better hands and eyes can do more than I have.

So there you are, my Army of the Potomac (actually about 2 brigades but it's a start).

Just a few Johnny Rebs to do now although I expect they will take a little bit longer as they have less regular uniforms.

What do you guys and gals think?

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